"You are talking about changing the past. Emma. Changing history! Not to mention the little issue of time travel."
"It can't be that hard, darling. Is the Phoenix all powerful?" Emma added a taunting edge to her voice to bring the "bird" out in Jean Grey, "or is she not?"
"It's not a question of can I," Jean retorted keeping a careful hold on the part of her that possessed that power, "It's a question of should I ... should we?"
"Oh please dear, Charles gallivants through time and space changing history all the time. I don't see him all wrapped up in guilt. Nor do I see our reality crashing around us." The White Queen gestured dramatically, but she could see she was not going to win this particular skirmish of the battle. She thought for a moment and then decided on another tack. "It's about saving a girl. Saving her sanity, maybe saving her life." Emma sat on the couch and pulled Jean down beside her and continued on in an earnestness that surprised even her. That was, she supposed, what came of residing with 'heros'. "A young girl, who has a power that she doesn't understand, and that her family fears, is unable to fully control those powers. So she's isolated and alone, scared, and destined to become what all isolated, alone people with great power become ..." Emma paused and looked Jean right in the eye, "feared by those around her, feared as a monster."
Jean didn't answer. This was not a good idea. And getting into a discussion about it with Emma wasn't going to help.
When she realized she wasn't getting a response, Emma stood up so fast she was a white blur. "But it's fine if you don't want to help. I completely understand," she snarled before she stalked off.
Jean watched her go pinching the bridge of her nose. She winced when she felt Emma's telepathic barriers slam into place. She jumped when she heard the door to their bedroom slam. Emma was touchy about almost anything sometimes, but she was always touchy when it involved children. Jean had her suspicions, some of which Emma had finally confirmed ... late at night when she was sure no one else was listening. Emma rescued children because no one had rescued her. Emma ran this school as a safe house she had never had one. Emma watched over her charges like a mother bear … sometimes a sarcastic bitchy mother bear, but a mother bear nonetheless … because no one had done that for her. Or as Emma herself had said, "My first real home was a lair of villainy disguised as a strip club, perhaps that might tell you something." Jean knew that try as she might she would never fill that hole, it went too deep; however, that was not a good enough reason to stop trying.
She knocked softly on their door and then pushed it open. Emma was sitting on their bed facing away from her, her shoulders sagging. When she heard Jean's footsteps, or felt the touch of her mind, it could have been either, she pulled herself up into her finishing school posture and said, "I didn't invite you in."
"I know. But I'm coming in anyway." She sat on the bed, legs curled up underneath her, facing Emma. "You know this is my room, too."
"That's what's comes of sleeping with the hoi polloi, manners fly right out the window."
"Emma, I understand."
"Do you?" She snapped and turned around, her eye blazing while she threw everything she had in to keeping the frosty distance that made her name. But Jean knew better. Jean could see through her cool sneer of disdain to where her lip quivered ever so slightly and a glint appeared in her eye, and it broke her heart every time.
"Maybe." She took her partner's hand in hers, and stroked her thumb along the top. "But just because your name is Frost doesn't make you the Queen of Ice and Snow."
"Not funny, Jean."
"I just don't understand what you want to do. How we can help. You can't teach her to control her powers, we don't have that kind of time. You wouldn't even know how to do that."
"I know." Emma chewed on her bottom lip. Her voice turned quiet and halting. "She's just a little girl, Jean. She is alone and afraid. I want to tell her that … that it will get better. That no matter how it feels now, when she is grown up she can be the person she wants to be. Because," she reached up and ran her long pale fingers through Jean's mane of red hair, "Things will change, control comes. I know it does. You know that, too." She felt exposed and raw and almost brave. She rested her head against Jean's chest, and listened to her steady heartbeat. "It gets better," she whispered to herself.
"Damn you, Emma." Jean breathed the words as she buried her nose in Emma's hair, no anger in her voice. She was going to do this. It was stupid. It might be disastrous, but Emma had asked, and she would do it. She held her for a time, savoring the rare vulnerability, until finally she knew she had to break the spell.
"It has to be fast. In and out." She turned Emma's face up to hers. "No hanging around for decades, while you create a little "Emma Frost, junior."
"Humph," Emma pouted, but she knew how to be a gracious victor, sometimes, "long term therapy usually works the best, but one conversation … Queen to 'soon to be Queen' … will still do some good."
Elsa lay awake in her bed, too afraid to sleep, too tired to do anything else. She was afraid if she went to sleep she would lose control and freeze the room again ... or hurt someone. Even if she didn't actually freeze anything, there was always the dream. Hitting Anna with her magic, only maybe this time she wouldn't wake up. This time she would turn into a block of ice. Something horrible, a frozen dead thing. Elsa's eyes snapped open again, and she curled up on herself shaking with terror. If she could just hold her eyes open until morning … if she could just ..."
She felt a gentle hand stroking her hair, running down her back. She tried to move away, but she couldn't get any deeper into her mattress. She heard a soft whispered, "Sssh. It's alright. Don't be frightened." She lifted her head from under the sheet.
Two things registered, one was that the woman sitting next to her was beautiful. Her hair as white as her own, and she was … shiny, almost glowing and wearing a shimmering, white … well, it had a cape and not much else. And then she realized that there was woman, a stranger, an angel maybe, sitting on her bed. The temperature plummeted and ice cracked across the sheets of her bed.
"Stay away from me."
"I won't hurt you," the woman said, her hand now still but touching Elsa's shoulder.
"Just please, stay away from me!"
"And you can't hurt me either," Emma reached out, took Elsa's hand and carefully tugged off the small white glove. She then placed it on the smooth surface of her forearm.
Elsa gasped. It … she was hard like ice. Was this someone she had already frozen? Someone she had killed? A ghost? Then Emma relaxed and dropped her diamond form. Elsa started at the unfamiliar feel of bare skin and pulled her hand back averting her eyes.
"But I could hurt you. I could! I hurt, I hurt my sister. I didn't mean to."
"No ... you can't ... not me." Emma gently redirected the girl's gaze back to her with finger on the child's chin. "And I know you don't want to hurt anyone. What we do matters, but why we do it matters just as much." She let a smile play on her face as she continued, "You have to forgive yourself. You have to think through your intentions. You can't let it haunt you forever." She watched as Elsa puzzled that one out. "Evil is not unwitting. Evil is not born; it is chosen." That had been a hard lesson for Emma, accepting her own culpability for the death and destruction in her wake. It was the reason she was here. She would prefer this child not have her regrets.
"Are you here to take me away?" Elsa finally asked. She wondered if the trolls had sent this woman, or Papa ... to keep Anna safe.
"No pumpkin," there was regret in Emma's voice. She wished she could, but that was probably beyond the pale.
"Then why are you ..."
"I'm here to give you some advice. To talk to you ..."
"About my powers …" the girl relaxed, but it was more like deflation than anything peaceful, "'bout how I need to hide them, and not use them, 'conceal it, don't feel it' … I know." Elsa recited the familiar litany.
"Not quite." Emma held up her own hand and slowly changed it from flesh to diamond and back again. Elsa watched intently. "I have "powers," too. I am Emma Frost, but people call me the White Queen."
Elsa blinked and then hopped out of bed. "Your Majesty," she said performing a remarkably poised curtsey for the middle of the night.
Emma laughed, "Your Highness." She returned her salute with a nod. "But I'm not here to give deportment lessons either." She patted the space next to her on Elsa's bed, then she realized it was still covered in ice."
"I'm sorry," Elsa sighed forlornly. "I can't make it go away. It just has to melt."
"That's alright, pumpkin," Emma said with a grin. "I can take care of that, too."
"You can make my ice melt?" Elsa said with a rush of interest.
"No, something better." Emma winked, "I have people." The White Queen closed her eyes and Elsa heard her voice calling, Jean ... but it was in her head. The answer was in her head too. Yes, honey.
Jean, we need a little help here. Would you come in?
Elsa gasped when another woman, this one with lots of red hair almost like her sister, walked right through the wall.
What do you need Emma? The other woman thought, and then seeing Elsa she added out loud, "Hi. I'm Jean. I'm Emma's …. friend."
"Are you a Queen, too?" Elsa asked.
"Oh no, honey. One queen in this relationship is more than enough. That spot is all Emma's." Jean leaned over and kissed Emma on the top of the head. "What can I do for you, my Queen."
"We have a little ice problem I need you to clean up, darling." Emma waved her fingers at the bed next to her.
"OK," Jean responded and then the ice was gone. Elsa couldn't believe it. The ice was completely gone, her bed was dry and even sort of warm. There was no ice or wet anywhere in her room."
"Can you …. can you teach me to do that?" she said breathlessly.
"Oh … sorry. No, honey," Jean looked very disappointed. "I wish I could, but … but it's not something I can teach." Now was probably not the time for a lengthy discussion on how possession worked. "It just happens."
"Oh, OK." Elsa seemed to take the bad news well for a nine-year-old. "I understand."
"But, pumpkin," Emma reached over and picked her up, plopping on her the bed next to her. "You will be able to do that yourself one day."
"Really?" Elsa didn't seem convinced.
"Really. I promise. It might take a while, but one day you will be able to control your powers completely. You will not have to be afraid of them. You will appreciate them for their beauty."
"And I won't hurt anyone?"
"And you won't hurt anyone," Jean said.
Emma added, "Unless they deserve it." Jean smacked her on the arm.
"We don't have to leave her helpless ..." Emma complained.
Then Elsa giggled. "You are funny. You two are very funny." Then she frowned with a thought. "Do you guys love each other?"
Emma was able to answer first, "Yes, pumpkin we do. I love Jean very much, and ..." she looked pointedly at her lover.
"And I love Emma more than anything in the world."
"More than chocolate?" Elsa asked innocently.
"Hmmmmm? Chocolate?" Now it was Jean's turn to get smacked on the arm.
"You remind me of … me … me and my sister. You even look like me ..." she pointed at Emma, "and my sister." She pointed at Jean. "I love my, sister too." Her little face fell with a sigh. "But Papa says we can't play together anymore, and I had to move into my own room … and I miss her so much."
Emma reached over and pulled the little girl into a hug, while Jean settled down with her arm around Emma.
After a moment Elsa spoke again, this time her voice clearer and not as sad, "But when I get my powers under control, then we can be together again … we can be together, and we can love each other like you guys love each other."
Jean looked at Emma, a spark of concern running through her eyes, but Emma just bent down to the little girl and said, "Yes. One day I promise, you will get to be with your sister. And you will get to love whomever you want. It isn't going to always be like this. It will get better. I promise." That was the sum of what she had come to say, to reassure the girl that her life would be more than closed doors and fear. Emma patted the space between the sheets. "Now, I think maybe you might want to get some sleep."
"Yes, I am kinda tired." Elsa wiggled between the sheets and yawned putting her head on the pillow. "Maybe I won't dream ... since you're here."
Emma reached out and put a gentle hand on the girls temple. It only took her a second to find where the memory was that sparked the night terror. She wanted to snuff it out, it would have been rather easy, it was right there. But she knew that wasn't the answer. Still she gave it the tiniest little shove back, just enough to make it seem a little bit more distant, a little less threatening, a little less present. With any luck, Emma hoped that doing this might give the girl some chance at sleeping; she looked exhausted.
"I hope you get a good rest, pumpkin."
"Are you … are you coming back?" Elsa asked her eyes starting to blink and close.
Emma ignored Jean's look. "I don't know. But even if we can't you'll be fine. I know you'll be fine." She leaned down and whispered softly. "You are going to be a fine, fine Queen."
"s'ats what Papa says, too ..." and then the gentle rhythmic breathing of sleep filled the room.
Jean let Emma watch the girl sleep for a little while, then she led her up off the bed and out of the room. When they reached the hall Jean looked to her right … at another door, very much like Elsa's, but with decorative pink scrolling instead of purple. "Give me a second."
"Oh, fine. You go on about Emma Frost junior, but if it's something you want to do …"
But Jean wasn't listening. She moved through the wall in her astral form and walked over to the bed of another sleeping girl. This one restlessly spread across her bed, arms akimbo, red hair tangled and falling into her face.
Jean leaned over. She didn't even need to touch the girl, she just reached out with her consciousness. "Your sister loves you, Anna," was all she left behind, but she thought it would be enough.